THE MASKS ARE COMING OFF

Mar 11, 2020 Features / Columnists, Peeping Tom

The President’s position in relation to the election is untenable. The President is seeking refuge in legalese – the formal and technical language of the law. What the President does not seem to understand is that had the law been complied with, there would have been no controversy and the elections would have already been decided fairly and squarely.
In a statement issued on Monday, the President was quoted as saying, “GECOM is an independent constitutional agency over which I and the Executive have no control. I assure you that as President, I cannot, did not, and will not interfere in the work of GECOM.”
In other words, the President is pleading helplessness. He is saying that he is prevented by law from interfering with the work of GECOM and has no intention of doing so.
No one is asking him to interfere in the work of GECOM. The fact that the Commission is independent does not preclude him from demanding particular courses of action. As a political leader, he is entitled to make such demands and representations.
The Commission’s independence did not prevent him from demanding credible elections and for insisting on house-to-house registration in the past. On 13th March 2019, the President wrote to then Chairman of the Guyana Elections Commission (GECOM), Justice (Ret’d) James Patterson, requesting that the Commission present him with a work programme in the shortest possible time.
In his letter to the Commission, he is reported to have written, “I urge you to present your plans, programmes and financial needs which will guide my proclamation of a suitable date for elections.” The President obviously did not see his demand for a work programme as interference in the work of GECOM.
Following the decision of the Caribbean Court of Justice (CCJ) that the no-confidence motion was valid, the President demanded house-to- house registration. He alleged then that the voters’ lost was invalid, expired and corrupted. Since GECOM is the agency responsible for managing the elections, his comments could only have been directed to that body.
The President obviously did not see his request for house-to-house registration as constituting interference in the work of GECOM. Yet he now wants us to believe that his expressing his and his coalition’s support for verified elections results for Region Four constitutes interference in the work of GECOM. He can tell that to his supporters. I am not buying that nonsense.
The President was the Presidential candidate of the APNU+AFC. As the Presidential candidate, he has an interest in ensuring that the tabulation process is done in the presence of all the parties. Why would he have allowed his party’s polling agents to observe the process in nine regions, yet not insist that this also be done to completion for all the polling stations in District Four?
Why have an election if unverified data is going to be used as the basis for the results? Why spend all those billions to conduct an election when the only result which one party is going to accept is a result favourable to that party? Why not just spin a coin every five years?
If the shoe was on the other foot, would he have accepted unverified results? So why does he expect that the other political parties would?
These elections have unmasked a great many persons. And the public is seeing for themselves the true image behind the masks. And what they are seeing is not necessarily what many of them expected.
There will be a great deal more unmasking in the days ahead. A truer picture will emerge.
The United States Department of Treasury publishes the names of every citizen of that country who has relinquished his or her citizenship. The list is published every quarter.
The Peeper has been perusing the lists for last year and for this year so far. I have been looking for a particular name. I am not finding that name. I really cannot explain why I am not finding it. Perhaps, I too am looking at unverified data. Or perhaps another mask has been removed.

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THE MASKS ARE COMING OFF

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